August 16, 2016 - 7:20am
Bake Bread Using Bleached Bread Flour?
I have a very established sourdough starter using un-chlorinated water and unbleached organic flour. However, I only have bleached bread four in the house to bake with at this time. I'm not sure if bleached flour would destroy everything once I mix it all together. Is it worth the risk? Has anyone tried this before? Thanks!
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Using it will also give you a baseline to see what differences and how much you see when you get and try using unbleached.
Although I typically use unbleached flour, I have used my starter with bleached flour and it works just fine. I've even fed the starter for short periods using bleached flour and it didn't seem any worse for wear.
Bleached flour is not my choice, either. I left my starter in my daughter's care for 2 months with detailed instructions so I would be able to use it when I got home. I didn't specify bleached/unbleached flour in the directions so guess which one she used? My culture was fed for 2 months with bleached flour for 2 months and I never noticed a difference when I came back. Pretty flexible- they will eat anything.
I have to ask if your father's name is Edward in the Chicago area. He would be in his 60's. Mayer is my maiden name and my cousin Edward had several kids-one who's name is Jennifer. I haven't talked to that side of the family in years. It would be a pleasant coincidence. Message me or email me at cslazarATgmailDOTcom.
Thanks for the help/encouragement:) Unfortunately Mayer is my married name and my family is originally from NY. That would have been cool tho!!
Bleached flour should be fine, as long as it's bread flour and not cake or pastry flour. There shouldn't be any reside in the flour that would interfere with the action of the sourdough starter, if that is what you're concerned about. Enzyme activity might be a bit different. The 'chemists' on this site will be able to provide more details on that!
Thank you all for your help. This is a great forum. I'll be sure to post pictures of my final product after using bleached flour with my unbleached flour starter! Thanks again!
than unbleached I guessing. No worries using bleached flour at all.